Mauresmo sets expectations high for winning defence

Brilliant, yet often baffling, the defending champion has the skills to win again but is never far from an embarrassing exit

AMELIE MAURESMO marauding on the grass, bounding and burning, will provide the most thrilling sight among the women at Wimbledon. She is thoroughly modern in her athleticism and power, but her serve-and-volley attacking impulses are quaintly historic. She sends down the service from a classically fluid action and she's on her way, Amazonian strides taking her towards the net; she checks, ready to move left or right, alert and balanced, arriving, when the ball comes her way, at the moment of truth.

But this is Amelie Mauresmo, so what happens next is a matter of anxiety for everybody. She may punch the perfect volley into the corner, or she may dump it in the net like a feeble novice. As she arrives back at Wimbledon after her exertions in Eastbourne, her prospects for The Championships are equally uncertain. She could successfully defend her title or she could lose early and